The Center for Disease Control (CDC) found that about 60% of all couples now
cohabit before marriage. They also surveyed 20,000 married couples (now married
15 years later) who had cohabited (CDC Cohabitation Study, 2012). They found
that if they were engaged and cohabiting, the divorce rate was the same as non-cohabiting
couples.

The is the same finding we discovered using PREPARE/ENRICH data, where
engaged cohabiting couples had about the same percentage of Vitalized couples
(51%) compared to dating non-cohabiting couples (51%) or engaged non-cohabiting
couples (60%). The most problematic group was dating cohabiting (not
engaged) couples where only 21% were Vitalized and 48% were Conflicted.

In comparing dating couples living together versus apart, the differences were dramatic. Only 21% of
the dating couples who are living together were Vitalized, compared with 51% of the dating couples
who were not living together. Even more telling, 48% of the cohabiting daters were in the Conflicted
range, compared with only 16% of those who were not living together.

Once your church or community has a trained and
certified PREPARE/ENRICH professional, you might
consider establishing a Marriage Mentor Program
to help premarital couples get more preparation or married couples get the assistance
they need for healthier relationships.